INSpiREzine Colours of the World | Page 44

1758

1766

Astronomer and mapmaker Tobias Mayer arranged hues in a triangle placing the primary colours - red cinnabar , blue azurite , and yellow gamboge - at either point on the shape . Mayer created 12 gradations between any two colours , which he believed was the maximum degree of variance that the human eye could distinguish . In 1775 , physicist George Christian Lichtenberg pared down the gradations from 12 to 7 per side .
In The Natural System of Colours , Morris Harris discussed the multitude of colours that could be created by using three “ grand or principle ” colours : red , yellow and blue . At the centre of the Prismatic Circle , Harris demonstrated what is nowadays known as the subtractive mixing of colours , showing that black could be formed through the superimposition of the three principle colours .